


There Will Come Soft Rains

by Euphorion



Series: Into the Spider-Verse Post-Scripts [2]
Category: Fantastic Four (Comicverse), Spider-Man (Comicverse), Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018)
Genre: Angst, F/M, M/M, Pining, Self-Hatred, Unrequited Love, past Peter B./his Gwen Stacy, sorry Johnny
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-03
Updated: 2019-05-03
Packaged: 2020-02-16 10:08:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,243
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18689350
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Euphorion/pseuds/Euphorion
Summary: “I was dead,” Peter said, and Johnny took a sharp breath. “In this other universe, Kingpin killed me.” He waved a hand. “Couple years back, I was still in grad school.” His mouth twisted. “Also I was blond.”“I must've inspired you,” Johnny joked, pushing it past the weird film clinging to his throat. Something occurred to him. “Wait, was I there?”Peter nodded, his eyes still on the sky. “Yeah,” he said, and then looked sideways at Johnny. “I mean, I never saw you, but Miles had a pic of the Spider-Mobile, and there's no way I built a car that hideous with anyone else.”Johnny felt himself smile at him, but his mind was whirling with weird, displaced anger.I was there,he wanted to say,and you were still dead? I was there and I didn't stop it?+Unrequited Johnny/Peter B. Parker. Sorry to Johnny but sometimes Peter & MJ...are in love.Title, like my previous ITSV coda, from Ray Bradbury.





	There Will Come Soft Rains

**Author's Note:**

> This is written with the presumption that Peter B. Parker is "our" (616) Peter, and thus this is 616 Johnny. You can tell by how sad he is

Peter Parker had been missing for four days and Johnny was absolutely definitely not letting it get to him.

It wasn’t exactly unusual for Peter to vanish for days, even weeks at a time. He was, after all, Spider-Man; sometimes he got called in by the Avengers or hauled off to space. But usually in the latter case it was Johnny doing the hauling, and anyway this wasn’t just _being gone,_ this was _missing._ Trashed apartment missing. Pizza stains on the damn ceiling somehow missing.

And. He hadn’t exactly been himself, lately, not for nearly a year now, not since he’d shown up at Johnny’s window with defeat in his shoulders and a copy of his divorce paperwork in his back pocket. (Which. Johnny still had, filed away in his personal documents, which he felt fine about—it was totally normal to keep track of your best friend’s legal documents because he couldn’t bear to have them in his home.) Johnny didn’t think he would hurt himself, not actively or with intent, but there were a lot of ways for a man in their line of work to commit suicide. He should know.

He set down on a rooftop and clenched his fists, quenching his flames with a sigh. There was nothing he could do. It’s not like he could file a missing person’s for a guy with a secret identity, and anyway surely he was fine. He was _fine,_ and Johnny had more pressing things to worry about. Like the thing that had gotten him out here tonight, wasting his time melting the snow off the eaves of a laundromat rather than at home watching Val and Franklin concoct some sort of intensely dangerous Christmas present for Reed. He wouldn’t mind so much—it was a beautiful night, the stars clear and bright above him—if it wasn’t so damn _embarrassing._

He’d lost Paste-Pot Pete.

He supposed he hadn’t really lost him, and he also supposed that technically he’d renamed himself the Trapster recently, which just made him sound like a terrible DJ. God, maybe he was a terrible DJ. Who even knew what Paste-Pot Pete did with his off-hours. But the fact remained that Johnny’d been coming out of the Bloomingdale’s on 59th, arms full of boxes (mostly for Sue— _mostly,_ with a few things he would label _To: Hot Stuff_ and feign surprise at under the tree) and caught sight of the familiar green and purple duds slinking into an alley.

Despite decades of bad behavior, Johnny couldn’t actually arrest the guy pre-crime, so he’d stashed his purchases and set off after him, staying high, as inconspicuous as it was possible to be when you were a blazing comet against a pin-prick sky. He’d followed Pete in a zig-zag mostly-alley path downtown and west before losing him under a patchwork of scaffolding and awnings. He was pretty transparently making a beeline for the diamond district, but beyond that...

He would curse the scaffolding and the fact that this damn city was always under reconstruction if he and his family weren’t half the reason it was.

He shifted back to street clothes (thanks, unstable molecules), dropped down off a fire escape, and jogged a block and a half further west. It wasn’t like the diamond district was that _big,_ and—

The storefront he was passing shattered outward in an explosion of glass, and he raised a palm just in time to shield himself. He set himself aflame, spinning to face whatever was coming through the window—there was no heat, so Pete hadn't blown anything up, this was just some kind of intense concussive force.

The Trapster slid across the pavement past him, landing on his back in the street about four feet beyond Johnny. In the storefront window, fist outstretched, framed by shattered glass, stood Spider-Man.

 _Well,_ thought Johnny, slightly hysterical with relief, _that definitely counts as intense concussive force._ He flamed off.

Peter seemed to notice him for the first time—trust him not to notice Johnny until after he’d stopped blazing with flame—and to Johnny’s horror started peeling up the edge of his mask. Johnny had a hand on wrist before he'd revealed more than a tiny sliver of neck, was pulling him out of the shop and up onto its roof before Peter could do more than muster a protest, and deposited him in a snowdrift as gently as could be arranged under the circumstances.

"What the hell!" he demanded. "You disappear for days and then the minute you're back you try to show your face to the whole damn street—"

Peter was hurt. He knew because he could see it in his stance—slightly unsteady, his hand drifting to his side as if to clutch ribs or kidneys—and he knew because Peter reached up with his other hand to finish the motion he'd started on the ground, peeling off his mask to reveal his lip split, his eye blackened badly. "It's fine," he said, his eyes not quite focusing on Johnny's face. "There was no one there but you and anyway everyone knows—everyone—" he froze, his gaze returning to Johnny after wandering all over the skyline behind him. "Johnny."

"Yeah," said Johnny. He gave a little wave.

"My—I'm back." Peter ran a hand over his face. "Oh, man. I'm actually back, it worked."

"Peter," Johnny said, confusion and worry outweighing his relief. "What worked? What _happened_ to you?"

"Doc Ock, most recently," said Peter, and started ticking things off on his fingers. "Before that, uh, Tombstone, I think, and before that Scorpion but maybe switch those. Put Prowler somewhere in there too, it all kind of blurs together. Did I just try and take my mask off in the middle of the street?"

"Yeah," said Johnny, trying to make sense of any of this. He was pretty sure Tombstone and Prowler were still in prison, last he'd checked, and no one had seen Scorpion in years.

"Oy," said Peter. "Thanks for, like, helping me not do that."

"No problem," said Johnny. "It's—"— _what I'm for_ —"—nothing. You wanna start at the beginning for me, or keep on with your laundry list of villains?"

Peter sighed. "I got pulled into an alternate universe. Not just me, like, a whole _bunch_ of me's."

"Oh," said Johnny, probably one of the few people on earth for whom that didn't mean more questions than answers. "That makes sense, actually."

Peter raised an eyebrow at him. "It does?"

Johnny nodded. "I went by your place," he said. "It's a mess, and not just the usual way—"

Peter looked wounded. "Hey—"

"But like a, everything got tossed up in the air and then thrown down again kind of mess. That sometimes happens with interdimensional portals—Reed says it has something to do with, like, quantum gravity, or something, I didn't really listen."

"Right," said Peter, looking amused. "Well—the mask thing. Everybody knew who I was, over there, and for a second I wasn't sure—it's very disorienting."

"Everyone knew?" Johnny asked, surprised. "Were you living openly, like the FF?" It was hard to imagine—Johnny could afford to have his face associated with his deeds because the people he cared about most were just as superpowered as he was, had entered into the deadly cat-and-mouse that was living as a hero willingly (sort of—cosmic rays notwithstanding). Peter had never had that luxury, and the idea that any version of him would put May or MJ or his friends in that danger was inconceivable.

"No," said Peter, and went quiet. He turned his eyes up to the sky, and Johnny waited, grateful for the opportunity to just take him in, reassure himself he wasn't kidnapped or gone forever or—

“I was dead,” Peter said, and Johnny took a sharp breath. “In this other universe, Kingpin killed me.” He waved a hand. “Couple years back, I was still in grad school.” His mouth twisted. “Also I was blond.”

“I must've inspired you,” Johnny joked, pushing it past the weird film clinging to his throat. Something occurred to him. “Wait, was I there?”

Peter nodded, his eyes still on the sky. “Yeah,” he said, and then looked sideways at Johnny. “I mean, I never saw you, but Miles had a pic of the Spider-Mobile, and there's no way I built a car _that_ hideous with anyone else.”

Johnny felt himself smile at him, but his mind was whirling with weird, displaced anger. _I was there,_ he wanted to say, _and you were still dead? I was there and I didn't stop it?_

“I figure you were in space or something,” Peter said, as if reading his mind. “I thought about seeking you out, if I'd—” he cut himself off, grimacing.

Johnny frowned. “If you'd what?”

Peter stared at him for a second, judging if he could get away with just changing the subject or maybe backflipping off a building, and then sighed. “If I'd stayed.”

Johnny felt it like a blow. “Pete—”

He held up his hands. “There was a _thing,_ ” he said. “A machine, it's what brought me there, it was going to destroy their universe, yadda yadda, someone would've had to stay behind and blow it up, and what was I going to do, let Gwen do it?”

“Gwen?” Johnny blinked. “Gwen was there?”

Peter waved a hand. “Not—not my Gwen, and not other me's Gwen, either. She was a kid.” He sagged. “It's been a weird week.”

He swayed, starting to half sit, half fall down, and Johnny caught him, slinging an arm around his back and lowering them both to the surface of the roof. He pressed a hand to the ground before they'd made it all the way down, sending a quick shot of heat through the concrete so the snowmelt flashed to steam and they had a dry place to collapse. Peter hissed as Johnny's arm shifted across his back; Johnny started pulling away, but his apology died on his lips when Peter gripped his bicep, just hard enough to keep him close. He raised his eyes, meeting Johnny's gaze.

Johnny swallowed. “Hi.”

“Hey,” Peter said softly.

The split in his lip was bleeding, but the bruising around his eye already looked better. His healing was a remarkable thing—Johnny often thought about what it would be like to watch it happen. He'd been awake enough times in the night while Peter slept off a concussion and a broken rib to stare hard at the dark until it pulsed with gold, wishing he could turn on the light and watch the curve of his back as blood and bruised flesh smoothed into healthy, breathing Peter again. Just to see him be okay.

(Any other reason he might stare aching at the dark while Peter slept in his bed or on his floor was inconsequential. Constant and hopeless. One of the world's certainties, like death and taxes.)

“I'm glad you're here,” said Peter, in that same soft tone, his hand squeezing Johnny's bicep. “It's—god, it's nice to talk to someone who isn't some version of me.”

“Me, too,” said Johnny, kind of inanely, and then clarified, “I'm glad you're here. With me. Back.”

He didn’t say _why are you back?_ because it felt rude and he wouldn't get the answer he wanted anyway, but it was the obvious question, hanging in the air between them.

Peter released his arm, and Johnny pulled back just enough to be able to breathe properly but not enough that Pete might think he was leaving, and settled next to him, legs dangling.

“You want kids?” Peter asked abruptly.

Johnny licked his lips, his heart not quite settled in his chest. It wasn't the first time they'd talked about this; Peter's divorce kind of centered on it, after all, but before Peter hadn't really wanted to know. Before, Johnny had always said something shallow, like _I don't know, maybe,_ and Peter had moved on into his reasons that he didn't, into all the ways he was sure he’d be a terrible father, all the ways he was convinced a child would have upset the delicate balance of his marriage and his duty to the city. All the ways someone might find out. All the deceptively simple ways a child can die.

This was different. Peter sounded light, almost wondering, a genuine curiosity underpinning a question that had always been leaden and leading. Johnny swallowed. "Yeah," he said. "More than anything, I—I always have."

Peter smiled. "You know, it never made sense to me that you wouldn't," he said. "The way you are with Franklin and Val—you'll be a great dad, Johnny."

"Thanks," said Johnny, voice valiantly steady. "Why, uh, why d'you ask?"

"I met the most amazing kid," said Peter. "He was that other world's new Spider-Man, got bit like a few days before other me kicked it, didn't even have web shooters yet—”

"Wait," said Johnny, frowning, "I thought you said you, uh, he died a few years ago?"

Peter waved a hand. "A few years ago in our timeline, it'd only been like a week or two in theirs. Different dimensions have different time scales, maybe? Does that check out?"

Johnny shrugged. "You'd have to ask Reed."

Peter nodded. "I will, I think," he said thoughtfully. His eyes were warm, fond. "I'd like to go back and see him sometime, see how he's doing."

Johnny fought off an absolutely ridiculous stab of jealousy about a kid he'd never met and probably never would. "This kid," he prompted. "Miles? You mentioned a Miles earlier."

Peter nodded. "That's him," he said. "He's the one who did it, who sent me back and destroyed the machine. I mean. Probably destroyed it. Unless Kingpin—nah, he won." He dropped his head, smiling slightly at his knees. "He won."

"You're sure?" Johnny asked.

"Yeah," said Peter. "I've got faith." He waved a hand. "Besides, I trained him, taught him everything he knows. If he can't do one measly world-saving fight, well, that's really on me."

His tone was joking, but Johnny knew him too well to buy it. He tried to imagine Peter training someone for less than a week and then sending them into battle against the Kingpin. He tried to imagine Peter—this Peter, barely social Peter, hollowed out from the inside Peter, agreeing to teach anyone _anything._

Peter turned at his silence, caught the look in his eye. “Other me kinda promised,” he said, “before the other promise, the deathbed promise. Plus this kid's got guilting puppy eyes like no one I've ever _seen,_ seriously, he could give Franklin a run for his money.”

Johnny snorted. In the arena of parental guilt, Franklin was unparalleled—Val tended toward _imperious,_ taking a little too much after her surrogate second father, but Franklin could make those angelic baby blues as big as soup-plates. Whatever a soup-plate was.

"Anyway, this kid—seeing him step up to what was facing him, to handle it, to take what I gave him and make it his own, I-I was so fucking _proud._ And it keeps making me proud, thinking about him. Thinking about him as a part of me, as continuing—" he waved a hand, "I don't know, my legacy, in a weird way. And if I could feel that way with him…"

Johnny could feel it coming, had felt it coming since he'd asked the question. But no matter how he tried to brace himself, he still had to sit there as Peter Parker turned to him, new light in his brown eyes, and said, "Johnny, I think I wanna have kids."

It was his final shield, really. The final wall, the final barrier between Johnny and a bottomless well of guilty, unbearable daydreams, the final switch he could firmly flip when his heart got away from him. None of the other compatibilities mattered, none of the other destined moments large and small, none of the looks or touches or comments, none of the ways it felt to stand side by side with him against the world could mean anything, could be stretched to any meaningful future, even after Peter was technically single. Because Peter didn't want kids.

"I want kids," Peter repeated, firmer, and vaulted cleanly over Johnny's last defense against him.

"That's great," said Johnny, bloodlessly. "That's, wow, what a change."

"Yeah," said Peter happily. "It's—obviously I'm still worried about all the same stuff, it's not like I'm not, but suddenly I understand why it's worth it. You know? Why she always knew it would be worth it."

Johnny, like a fish taking a hook to get out of a net, seized on that last. "You're gonna tell Mary Jane, then?"

Peter nodded. "I saw her, too, over there," he said. "She was, god. She was perfect. I can't do it over, you know? I can't go back in time and be that poor dead grad school asshole for her. But. I can try and make it up to her now."

"I mean, technically you could go back in time," Johnny said, "it's not that different from dimension travel, really. But I agree that talking to her like an adult is probably a better idea."

Peter chuckled. "Yeah," he said, and pushed himself to his feet, dusting off his knees. "Thanks, Johnny."

Johnny stared up at him. "Wait, you're going _now?"_

Peter shrugged. "No time like the present."

Johnny scrambled up. "No," he said.

Peter raised his eyebrows at him.  "Sorry?"

Johnny ran a hand over his face, wishing he'd just let him go. But. "No offense, dude, but you look like shit. You can't just show up like this—" he gestured to Peter's general blood-stained dishevelment, "and expect her to take you back. Or even take you seriously. You want her to think you're gonna be a good dad, right?"

"Yeah," said Peter, "but—"

Johnny reached out and squeezed his shoulder. "Come back to the Baxter Building," he said. "Get cleaned up, eat something, get some rest. In the morning you can show up and make your case." He mustered his best attempt at a smile. "I think I even have something you can wear."

+

They retrieved his purchases from the alley where he'd stashed them. They were a little damp from snowmelt, but nothing Johnny couldn't steam out once they'd gotten them home. Peter immediately piled all of them in his arms—Johnny had insisted they take a taxi home rather than flying or swinging—despite Johnny's protests that he could at least carry _something._

"You shop, I carry," insisted Peter. "Archie Comics taught me that."

Johnny made a face at him. "Am I Veronica Lodge in this scenario?"

Peter laughed. "Rich bitch? Seems to fit." He reached out and tugged a curl of Johnny's hair. "Though this and your winsome smile put you firmly in the running for Betty, too."

Johnny knocked his hand away, feeling his cheeks heat. _Mary Jane is Betty, surely,_ he almost said, _she was literally your girl next door._ But there was joking about competing for your best friend's affections and then there was joking about competing for your best friends affections with his _wife,_ and apparently Johnny still had some lines he wouldn't cross.

"Oh," said Sue as they walked into the Baxter Building's living room, not looking up from her book. "Johnny, Reed said to join him in his lab when you got home, he found some traces of dimensional disturbances around Peter's apartment that you'll probably want to check out."

Johnny hooked a thumb over his shoulder. "Thanks," he said, "but I found him."

Sue looked Peter over, raising an eyebrow. "You've looked better."

He grinned at her. "I've felt better," he said, "but honestly? Not in a while."

Sue's second eyebrow rose to join her first. "Glad to hear it," she said, bemused. "Welcome back."

"Thanks," Peter said, winking, and followed Johnny into their kitchen.

Johnny stopped to grab some leftovers and a six-pack of Ben's beer out of the fridge before heading straight to his room. It was late—Val and Franklin would already be in bed, and anyway the idea of hanging out with his family right now was unbearable. He needed not to be around anyone who could tell how he was fraying at the edges, and luckily Peter never could. Not when it was about him, anyway.

Behind him, Peter popped his head back around the corner to add, "Hey, Sue, tell Reed I would like to take a look at what he picked up at my place sometime, though. I've still got some unanswered questions."

"Sure," said Sue.

Johnny was grateful for the chance to kick some of his clothes into a slightly more organized pile than just ‘right where he took them off’ before Peter wandered tiredly in, raising his eyebrows. He crossed his arms at the expression. "So maybe you're not the only one who's a bit of a mess," he snapped, challenging Peter to comment on the disassembled robot parts in one corner, the badly-hidden pile of Christmas presents in another, the still-open med kit on his desk from when he messed up his hand punching out the rogue Doombot (hence the robot parts) the other week. He slung the six-pack onto his desk chair and flopped down on his bed.

Peter eyed it. “You know I don’t drink,” he said. “That didn’t change from all the dimension-hopping.”

“It’s for me,” said Johnny defensively, almost hoping he’d object so they could fight about it, so he could stop feeling wound so tight, waiting to snap.

He didn’t. They really barely spoke, and Johnny didn’t end up drinking much, either. Peter inhaled the leftover Chinese and then took himself off to the shower, and Johnny lay on his back for about fifteen minutes trying not to think about him being in the shower, and then got up to put on a sleep shirt that wasn’t the Spider-Man one he’d been wearing for four days, and then lay back down again. When Peter came back in, towel around his waist, it almost felt—normal. As normal as Peter being mostly-naked in Johnny’s space ever felt.

He averted his eyes as Peter got dressed in the same pajamas he always borrowed, then settled on the floor next to the pile of robot-parts. “Can I see?” he asked.

“Go for it,” Johnny said, and flopped over on his stomach to watch him.

Peter hummed, sorting through transformers and circuit-boards and bits of green-etched armor plating. Johnny loved when he was like this, his hair soft and damp, his eyes sharp as he made connections only he could see. He loved Peter in almost every state Peter had, but there was something so charmingly unselfconscious about absorbed-in-work Peter, something self-contained and quiet and creative, as different from Reed’s obsessive silences as day and night but still cut somehow from the same genius cloth.

“No good,” he murmured after a moment, though he didn’t stop messing with a mostly-complete robotic hand. “I thought I might be able to use some of this stuff for something, but it’s all—magicky. Typical Doom mixed methods.”

Johnny propped his chin on his fist. It was a kind of send-off, he reflected. He'd never gotten to do this, the first time. Peter and Mary Jane had already been married by the time Johnny found out who was under Spidey's mask, and he hadn't known Peter Parker: high school teacher well enough to snag an invite to whatever bachelor party shenanigans that guy had had. He'd never gotten a chance to say goodbye, because nothing had ever really left him; he'd just found out one day that it was already gone.

Maybe this is what he needed. To really, truly move on, maybe this is what had to happen: the universe dropping Peter in his lap, talking about being a dad, and saying, _okay, now help give him back to her._

Or maybe he just wanted to hang out with him a little more before he had to let his stupid hopes go. That seemed more likely. If you scraped away the silver paint on any of Johnny's selflessness you got to the selfishness underneath pretty quick.

“So,” Peter said, knocking Johnny out of his spiral of self-recrimination. He set the hand down, sitting back on his heels. “You said you might have something for me to wear?”

“Oh, yeah,” said Johnny. He got up, crossing to the packages Peter had left next to his pile of Christmas presents. He put aside the ones for Sue and Reed, peeked under the lids of the ones he’d splurged on for himself, with an eye toward getting them tailored. “Here we go.”

It was a dove-grey silk suit, single-breasted, with wide lapels. Peter raised his eyebrows at it.

“You can try it on in the morning,” Johnny said. “It’ll probably fit you pretty well, it was a little wide in the shoulders for me.”

Peter reached out, touching the lapel. “You just happened to buy this today?”

Johnny shrugged. “Yeah,” he said. “You know. Retail therapy.”

Peter shook his head. “You know I’m a guy who doesn’t really believe in fate, or whatever, but that is a damn good suit delivered to me by damn good hands.”

“Must be nice,” Johnny muttered, ignoring the last bit as too easy even for his innuendo brain.

“What?” Peter asked, as Johnny closed the box and returned it to the pile.

“I said _glad you like it_ ,” Johnny lied, wandering back to his bed.

Peter followed him, settling on the edge of the bed. “No, you didn’t.”

Johnny sighed. “No, I didn’t,” he admitted. “I said. Must be nice. Like. Not to believe in fate.”

“It’s pretty easy,” said Peter. “I just believed in it and then the thing I believed in didn’t happen, so I stopped.”

Johnny squinted at him. “Was it MJ? Because seems to me that’s just delayed, not—”

Peter shook his head. “It wasn’t MJ.”

“Then what—oh.” Johnny licked his lips. “It must have been weird, huh? Seeing her but not her.”

Peter smiled at nothing, the sad, sideways smile he always got when he thought about Gwen. “Yeah,” he said. “Not that much weirder than the rest of it, honestly?”

Johnny raised his eyebrows, surprised. “I find that hard to believe.”

Peter fixed him with a look. “Johnny. There was a version of me who spoke in, like, 1920s slang, and was _always in black and white._ I don’t mean dressed in black and white, I mean—everything. Like he’d been painted, but it never came off. He didn’t even really have shades of grey, it was just, like, what’s that shading technique with all the little dots?”

Johnny shook his head, distracted by the simultaneous ideas of 1) 1920s detective Peter and 2) multiple Peters in one place. He’d mentioned it earlier, but it hadn’t really sunk in. “You’d have to ask Sue, I was always garbage at art.”

“Whatever, he had that. Instead of, like, _shadows._ ” Peter was more animated than he’d been since he’d gotten back, waving his hands for emphasis. “There was a me who was a _pig._ ”

Johnny blinked away extremely weird threesome daydreams. “A pig? Like the actual animal? Not, just, like, mean slang for a cop?”

Peter grimaced. “His name was Peter Porker.”

Johnny—after searching his face for any sign this was an elaborate joke—burst out laughing.

After a moment, Peter joined him, and for a moment it was like being sixteen again, losing it on a rooftop with Spider-Man, their shoulders knocking together. The walls were closer and the feelings were deeper but all the pain lifted away, leaving a comfortable, delicate intimacy that remained after they’d subsided into occasional giggles.

Until Johnny, wiping his eyes, said: “What am I in that universe, prime rib?” and set them off again.

They fell asleep together on opposite sides of Johnny’s bed, two grown-ass men acting like thirteen-year-olds at a sleepover. Peter would occasionally mutter a new absolutely ridiculous detail about his inter-dimensional adventure (“did I mention the girl-me from the future with the spider-mech?”) that made Johnny snort into his pillow, his mind too full of conflicting images to have any space for the pain of the day. It’d hit him hard eventually, he knew, but right now he let himself just—drift away.

He woke to see Peter already up, pulling the suit pants over his hips. Johnny let himself ride out the final moments of sleep, let his eyes shift over the skin of Peter’s back as he bent to pick up the dress shirt from the floor. The bruising on his ribs was faded yellow, a cut down his shoulder-blade just a white scar that’d be gone in another few hours. It was a shame about the scars, Johnny thought sometimes; scars were hot.

“Hey,” said Peter, and Johnny shifted his gaze up to his face, but not too fast. It’s not like it mattered if he was caught, if Peter knew. It’s not like any of it mattered. “Morning, sleeping beauty.”

“G’morning,” said Johnny, and finally forced his body to move.

Peter buttoned up the shirt while Johnny considered whether or not he’d get dressed at all today, then pulled on the suit jacket. He was frowning, looking around for something. Johnny jabbed his chin to the corner, where he’d left his socks, then pointed when Peter didn’t notice. “There,” he said. “Pete—there, in the corner.”

Peter sighed and flicked out a wrist, retrieving them with a precise web-shot. “Thanks,” he said. “Sorry, I’m—”

Johnny slipped out of bed to help him with his cuffs. “You’re freaking out,” he said. “Don’t."

“Easy for you to say,” said Peter. “You’re not about to have a conversation that determines the future of your marriage and the rest of your entire damn life.”

“Neither are you,” said Johnny.

Peter blinked at him. “What?”

“You’re going to talk to your ex-wife, hopefully soon to be your wife again,” Johnny explained, “but that’s not gonna all happen today. If you expect it to you’re just gonna freeze up and mess it up again.”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence,” Peter muttered, but he let Johnny inspect him, twitching the lines of the suit straight.

“I’m right,” Johnny said simply.

Peter made a face. “Yeah,” he said reluctantly.

“Don’t go in there all, _MJ guess what I want kids so we can get married again tomorrow and everything is perfect again,_ ” Johnny warned. “There’s a lot of hurt here on both sides, you know that.”

Peter licked his lips. “Yeah,” he said again, a little more certain.

Johnny brushed nonexistent dust off the lapels of his suit jacket. “Start with a date,” he said. “Tell her what went down in the other universe, the stuff that matters. Take it slow.”

“She’ll like that I saw Gwen.” His sweet, sad smile was back. “That she’s out there, fighting, living. And May—Aunt May hit Tombstone with a bat.”

Johnny smiled at him, and Peter finally met his eyes. It was easier, today, somehow; less raw. He felt less vulnerable, less like he was all sharp edges. After all, nothing had _really_ changed: they were still Johnny Storm and Peter Parker, still Spider-Man and the Human Torch, still friends and nothing more. “Yeah,” he said. “Yeah, tell her that stuff. Work in the apology later. The kids stuff, probably last. Well, maybe pig last. Maybe keep pig in your back pocket in case you need a laugh.”

Peter chucked him under the chin, his knuckles brushing Johnny’s jaw. “You know, for a guy with lousy luck with girls, you sure have a lot of romantic advice.”

 _It’s what I’d want you to do with me,_ Johnny thought, and then carefully stepped back. “Those who can’t do, teach.”

“That was always Aunt May’s least favorite aphorism,” Peter said, checking himself out in Johnny’s full-length mirror. He looked good. Obviously. Johnny wondered if he knew it. “She always said it should go, _those who can teach, teach; those who can do, teach by example._ She said otherwise you just get lousy teachers.”

“Well, you’d better hope in this case she’s wrong,” said Johnny.

Peter grinned. “There’s a first time for everything.”

Johnny pulled on his jeans. “C’mon,” he said, “I’ll walk you out.”

Ben was in the kitchen making coffee, and he raised rocky brows as Peter and Johnny passed him. “Spidey. You’re back. And you’re fancy.”

“Am I?” Peter asked, feigning surprise. “Hadn’t noticed. How’s it going, big guy?”

Ben shrugged, rumbling. “Y’know, same old soup, reheated.” He looked at Johnny, and back at Peter. “Gettin’ ready for a date?”

“Yes,” said Johnny quickly, before Peter could say anything, “with his ex-wife, and he doesn’t need you making him any more nervous about it, so we’re gonna go. I’ll be back in a sec, save me a cup.”

There was a slight, guilty pause, and then Ben said, “You got it,” and Johnny was maneuvering Peter into the elevator, the sound of Ben whistling a little tune following them down.

“He seems cheerful,” Peter commented.

“Yeah,” Johnny said absently, “things are going well with Alicia lately.”

Peter grinned. “Cute. Love is in the air, huh?”

Johnny bit the inside of his cheek. The elevator dinged. “Yep.”

Once they were on the street he stopped, blowing out a breath. “Need me to hail you a cab?”

Peter rolled his eyes. “I’m not that broke. Besides, I’ll just take the subway. Wanna feel the city, you know? Know it’s mine. It’s not the same as swinging, but.” He shrugged. “That’s for later.”

Johnny nodded. “If you need anything else,” he started, and then stopped. What? Call him after? So he could listen to how well it went and help set the date for the re-wedding?

But Peter didn’t seem to notice, reaching out and pulling him into a hug, his fingers curled gentle around the back of his neck. “Thank you,” he said, and Johnny closed his eyes, breathing him in. “Seriously. For everything.”

Johnny swallowed hard. “Anything for you,” he said, and then added a slightly belated, “buddy,” because the sincerity sat too heavily on his tongue. He clung, for a moment, and Peter let him, hopefully interpreting it as relief or an extra good-luck wish, and then pulled away.

“I’ll, uh, wash the suit and return it—” he started.

Johnny waved a hand. “Keep it,” he said, “it looks better on you, anyway. Too understated for me.”

“I was a little worried you’d put me in something with flame decals,” Peter joked.

Johnny rolled his eyes at him. “Go on, then.”

“Right.” Peter set his shoulders and started down the sidewalk, then turned on his heel and came back. “Johnny.”

Johnny stared at him, puzzled. “Yeah?”

“I—” Peter frowned. “If I can ever return the favor somehow—”

“My relationship with my ex-wife is a _little_ different, Pete,” Johnny said drily. “It’s fine, you don’t have to do anything. Stop stalling and get out of here.”

“But you’ve done so much,” Peter argued. “This whole time—through the whole divorce, it’s not that I didn’t notice—”

“Peter—”

“—and it doesn’t seem _right,_ is all. I’m gonna do something, is there something you want—”

“No,” said Johnny, slightly desperate. The calm, or nihilism, or whatever of the morning was wearing thinner and thinner under Peter’s gaze. “No. Just—go. That’s what I want. I want you to—to go, and make it work.”

“Fine, Tim Gunn,” Peter said. “But I’m going to make this up to you somehow.”

 _Please don’t,_ Johnny thought. “Okay, whatever,” he said, forcing a laugh. “We’ll figure something out. Just. Get out of here. Please.” He met Peter’s eyes, swallowing. “Please, Pete.

Peter watched him for another moment, then reached out and for the second time in half an hour brushed his fingers against Johnny's jaw. Then he turned and walked down the street.

“Buy her flowers!” Johnny yelled after him, and went inside without waiting for a response.

Ben handed him coffee himself when he got off the elevator, and hovered as Johnny sank down onto the couch like a puppet with his strings cut, balancing the mug on his chest.

“Sorry ‘bout the date comment,” said Ben. “I thought maybe you two kids finally—”

“I know what you thought, Ben,” said Johnny tiredly.

“Right,” said Ben. He maneuvered himself into his armchair, specially designed to take his weight but still resemble something out of Aunt Marygay’s extremely tacky attic. “Y’wanna watch somethin’? Fast ‘n Furious?”

“Not Fast 7, I’ll cry,” said Johnny. He sat up a little. “Maybe the first one.”

Ben nodded. “Sometimes it’s nice to think about how things got started,” he said, “‘stead of where they’re goin’.” He waved a hand. “Be, like, thankful for all the stuff we got along the way.”

Johnny looked sideways at him. “I get it,” he said, “you’re not subtle.” But it helped, somehow, and watching Vin Diesel in a tank top working on a frankly ridiculous car would help more, probably. “Yeah, load it up.”

Ben did, and during the incredibly dated opening credits he stretched out his big leg and kicked Johnny’s leg gently. “You’ll be alright, kid.”

“Yeah,” said Johnny, and almost believed it. “I will.”  


**Author's Note:**

> this started as practicing Peter B's voice and ended up being 6k somehow
> 
> I promise I'll write someone lovin' on Johnny soon to make up for this sorry y'all


End file.
